Mind games.

I think the hardest part of living abroad and away from family and friends is the mind games your mind plays on you.

Today my heart is just aching with every breath. The whole day my mind has been wandering around all the places I’ve been growing up and our holiday time share we had in Hazyview, Mpumalanga. I remember all the smells, textures and sounds so vividly still. This is something that will never go away. Memories that can never be replaced by new experiences. Not because new experiences are bad, they are good, but the places I grew up in and places we went on vacation, and the houses we lived in were all part of making me into the person I am today.

This quote really just hits the nail on the head for me. I am missing people and places today. Every day, but some days like today that hole in my heart is just a little more raw than others.

My mind makes me think it would still all be the same if I ever went there again or maybe better, but that’s a lie. Nothing is the same anymore. Everything has deteriorated sharply since we left SA. The roads are worse, the electricity and water supply system is worse, basic food prices are barely affordable and with 87 murders per day the country of my birth is home to 6 of the most dangerous cities on the continent of Africa!!

I just miss the way things were and it will never be the same again!!

When you are in the thick of it all, living in a place where the deterioration is on a daily basis, you don’t realize it. It’s just another 4-8hours of no electricity. It’s just another water shifting cycle. It’s just another house break in. Just another farm attack that escalated to torture and murder of the family. It’s just another Rand added to bread and milk. It’s just another racial law. It’s just another race quota on a sports team. It all becomes acceptable, because you become conditioned and your mind is in survival mode. You just accept it. Most people just HAVE to accept it, because they just don’t have a choice. They can’t go anywhere and that thought breaks my heart the mOst!

So yes, the games that my mind plays on me here in the foreigns are tough. Some days are harder than others.

But there is one sure thing I still know. We are surrounded by MANY MANY people who love and support us here. Many with whom we are making a lot of new memories with. Memories and moments I will long for when I am old. And then when I start counting my blessings and the people God has given us here and made part of our lives the hurt of missing our loved ones is comforted and I breathe a little easier knowing that I am not alone and I am blessed beyond anything I could ever dream or think and I am grateful for that.

So, if you are also living abroad or simply only in another town away from your loved ones, make a list of all the wonderful people around you and you too will soon see that your hurting heart turns into a grateful heart and the hurt is comforted again.

S.